Londongrad

I?”

“You were thinking something you didn’t want to tell me. You want to walk outside for a minute? Grab a smoke?”

“Sure,” said Rolly, talked to another bartender, and went out onto the street with me where he lit up a smoke and sighed.

“Valentina,” I said. “You knew her. How well? Listen, level with me. Tell me what you thought about her, don’t fucking hold back, okay?”

Drinking his beer, he looked surprised.

“You sure, mate? I mean, you’re her dad’s pal, right?”

“Just fucking please tell me.”

“Men were crazy for her, and she was drop-dead gorgeous when she bothered, I’m saying sometimes she came by, no makeup, old pair of jeans, she was okay, but when she was done up, it was like Jesus H. fucking Christ. She was fantastic, I might be gay but I know sex on a stick.” He glanced at me. “I’m sorry.”

“She had friends?”

“Sure. Girlfriends. Men. Men came round like bees to honey, though she was bloody demanding.”

“One guy in particular?”

“Oh, yeah, baby,” said Rolly with emphasis, while he took big sucks on his smoke. “Now he was very cool.”

“Did he pay for the drinks?”

“Of course not. It was her daddy’s club, they didn’t pay though I got the impression he wasn’t absolutely rolling in it, the boy I mean.”

“Was he after her father’s money?”

“Who can tell? You want to know the actual truth about her, Valentina, the way I saw it?”

I nodded.

“She was a scary girl. Intense, you know?” said Rolly. “She’d talk about orphanages in Russia, the bloody politics of the place, I could see some of the customers look at her as if she was mad.”

“Anything else you can think of about the boyfriend?”

“Just he looked amazing, crazy about her, a lot of fucking charm, mate. Perfect manners. Never said a thing when she started in on one of her rants, but I could see it made him uncomfortable when she talked about how corrupt officials in Moscow are, I mean it’s not fucking brilliant in a club like this to say Putin has billions stashed in a Swiss bank, is it?”

“And she liked him?”

“Crazy about him. I think she was one of those girls who everybody wants, but she had never really fallen for anybody, and this time, it was very big, very hot.”

“He was Russian, wasn’t he?”

“I didn’t notice. Yes, I think so. He only spoke English to me. Said his name was Greg.”

“Nothing else?”

“Not with me,” said Rolly. “But I was just the help. I better go back in. You coming?”

There wasn’t much more I could get at the club so I went back to the house which was a few blocks away and sat in a canvas chair on Tolya’s patio. It was back of the house and joined up with the communal gardens just beyond. Fireflies spat their glitter onto the thick dark summer night, and I sat, drank some Scotch and watched people go in and out of their houses.

They carried trays and bottles, they sat around outdoor tables and yakked and laughed. Kids ran on the grass.

For a while I tried to figure how to look for a man who had killed Sverdloff’s daughter as a warning.

From my cell I called Bobo Leven in New York, told him to get me anything he had on Tito Dravic, the Brooklyn club manager. Told him to keep working everything, including the initial m carved on Masha. I wasn’t convinced it was her own initial, I was guessing the killer left it because he liked to sign his work. Then I went into Tolya’s house through the garden door.

Sleepless, I wandered through the house. On the marble mantel in the living room was a stack of invitations, heavy white cards. I picked them up. Balls. Parties. Picnics. Races. One was for Saving Girls, a charity ball. Host: Anatoly Sverdloff. It was Val’s charity. I looked at the date. The night after the next. I’d be there. I wanted to know what these people had heard, how much they knew. Russians.

From the room where I crawled into bed finally, but still restless, I leaned on one arm and looked out the side street window. Tolya’s SUV was there, and his guy, Ivan, was leaning against it, smoking. I could see the burning red tip of his smoke.

A minute or two later, another car drove slowly up the street, slowly maybe just to avoid the speed bumps, maybe because the driver was looking for something.

I changed rooms. I went to bed in a room away from the street. I put the gun Tolya had given me on the bedside table. The clock, an alarm clock in a blue leather case, was next to it. The illuminated green dial read 3.04.

Couldn’t sleep. Got up one more time, smoked a while, standing at the window, saw black shapes outside, something in the gardens, maybe just teenagers, maybe something else. I felt trapped between the two sides of the house.

Exhausted, jet-lagged, so heavy I felt like I was carrying somebody else, another whole body, on my back, I dozed. Except for a few miserable hours sucking in stale air on the plane, I hadn’t slept for a couple of nights.

Only now, in my half-sleep, then in my dreams, did I finally grasp that Valentina was really gone. I pushed my face into the pillow.